A new autopsy performed on a young woman whose death shocked Mexico revealed that the woman died of asphyxiation due to suffocation “in her variety of obstructed breathing holes,” investigators reported Monday. The autopsy results did not specify what blocked Debanhi Escobar’s nose and mouth. The 18-year-old girl was found dead inside a partially filled cistern at a motel near the city of Monterrey, in northern Mexico, last April.
Dr. Felipe Takajashi, director of the Mexico City forensic service, said the most recent autopsy on the woman’s exhumed remains revealed no signs of sexual violence. He stated that she died three to five days before her body was found. Escobar’s body was found days after he got out of a taxi in the middle of the road at night. The case drew attention due to the heartbreaking photo taken by the taxi driver who was supposed to take her home that night. The driver said that she got out of the vehicle at her will and that he took the picture to show that she was alive when he dropped her off.
The photo touched the hearts of several people across the country: A young woman standing in the middle of the night on the side of a road in a skirt and sneakers. The image seemed to expose Escobar’s tremendous vulnerability and security, or desperation. The authorities decided that it was necessary to exhume his remains after the first two analyzes yielded contradictory results.
The head of the Nuevo León forensic medical service initially said that Escobar died from a blow to the head, but that he was apparently alive when he entered the cistern and that there was no water in his lungs.
But another forensic analysis of the initial autopsy done at the request of Escobar’s family concluded that she was sexually assaulted and murdered.
Her father, Mario Escobar, has said he was told by prosecutors that security camera footage indicated the taxi driver had inappropriately touched his daughter. The case has been surrounded by mysteries. Authorities had searched parts of the motel several times before the body was found.
Footage from the motel’s security cameras showed Escobar entering the motel and wandering around, eventually walking away from the cameras and heading to where three cisterns were located near a swimming pool. Some reports had indicated that the woman may have accidentally fallen into one of the cisterns and died. Prosecutors said her body was found in one of the tanks, her bag in another, while her cell phone and her keys were in the third tank.